Guadagnino's satirical film portrays Sam Altman as amoral manipulator

Summarised from 2 outlets · Updated 8 Oct, 15:37 · Archive

Director Luca Guadagnino's new film Artificial, premiered at the New York Film Festival, depicts OpenAI CEO Sam Altman as an unscrupulous figure pursuing power.

Director Luca Guadagnino's satirical film Artificial, which premiered at the New York Film Festival, depicts OpenAI CEO Sam Altman as an unscrupulous figure pursuing power. The film stars Andrew Garfield as Altman and reimagines the origin story of OpenAI through a campy comedic lens.

According to The Verge, the film sticks remarkably close to factual events surrounding Altman's rise to power and his brief ouster from OpenAI. At the premiere, Guadagnino stated that the idea of someone wanting to play God was central to the film's narrative. The Verge describes the portrayal of Altman as showing him using the metaphor of San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge to convince cofounder Ilya Sutskever of their vision, then to control him. Other characters are depicted as exaggerated versions of themselves, including Elon Musk shown as a cringe millennial, and OpenAI president Greg Brockman as an ultra-loyal follower interested in money and power.

The Guardian describes the film as a blunt satire depicting Altman as an amoral manipulator, functioning more as an op-ed than a traditional film. It notes that the film has little insight into what makes Altman and the tech elite tick. Amazon MGM Studios withdrew from distributing the film in June, reportedly due to parent company Amazon's $50 billion investment in OpenAI.

How it is being reported

• Artificial is a wicked satire that also sticks to the factsAt the New York Film Festival premiere of Artificial, Luca Guadagnino's satirical Sam Altman biopic, the director said onstage that "[when] someone wants to play God, that's very interesting to me." The idea of playing God, and power in general - who has it, who desperately wants it, and who will do anything to get […]The Verge · 8 Oct, 15:00
• Artificial review – Luca Guadagnino takes on OpenAI in muddled tech satireNew York film festival: The origin story of Sam Altman’s company is reimagined as a campy comedy starring Andrew Garfield On the day that Luca Guadagnino ’s film about Sam Altman and OpenAI premiered, Vanity Fair released a cover story on Altman. Alongside glossy portraits from Annie Leibovitz, the world’s pre-eminent portrait photographer, the story describes him as the Oppenheimer of his day, evoking the image of a man leading humanity towards its own inevitable demise at the hands of sentient robots. Altman doesn’t seem to be grappling with much existential angst about the whole thing…The Guardian · 6 Oct, 17:58

In this story: Luca Guadagnino · Sam Altman · OpenAI · Andrew Garfield · Elon Musk · Greg Brockman · Amazon MGM Studios · New York Film Festival

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